We work hard, spending time, effort, and energy to improve our positions in this world and to change the world itself around us. We make towns and cities out of cut stone, dried clay bricks, and wooden planks, altering the landscape to better serve us. We learn and grow, developing new Skills and strengthening our bodies, seeking rewards for the efforts we expend.

We work, we build, we grow.

Unrealized potential energy surges through my flesh, trapped as a torrential flood that rushes through every corner of me. Like a river that’s overflowing its banks, the mana is constantly on the verge of escaping me and breaking out beyond my influence. I maintain the current shape of the flow with all my mind focused on the task, but if I get distracted, I’ll start shedding power again.

Unity has long since surpassed this stage, and that stolen experience aids me now, but no cheat sheet is going to make this easy. I’m much more stable, but I’m still far from containing the powerful storm raging inside.

In a minute, I’ll finish my practice and burn through this mana, feeding it into my flesh and bone. I must alter my physical being to prepare myself for the crystallisation to come. Again, Unity’s guidance helps me to ensure that I miss nothing, but there is a question that I need to consider once more.

How much of my body do I really need to keep?

I intend to keep my body in functional order, even in a situation where I lose all of my mana. It’s why I’m keeping the organic systems of my body rather than replacing them with more magical counterparts. Choosing to reinforce rather than replace my flesh is possibly going to limit me in the future, but I’m going to continue on this path regardless.

I’d rather not have any extra weaknesses.

Feeding all of my mana into my throne, I drain myself to nothing and let the ache spread throughout my body. A deep chill cuts me down to the bone where only a single small spell has been kept. It doesn’t deteriorate immediately but the mana does start to destabilise within my mortal body.

I take slow, calming breaths as the trembling takes me and the chill starts to fade to a numb warmth. I fend off the mana surrounding me, keeping it at a distance and leaving it to grate against my skin like sandpaper.

After thirty seconds the tremors pass, and slowly I open my eyes.

Most of my Skills and adaptions are quiet, my vision little more than that of an ordinary mortal. I’m still connected to the mana stored in my throne, so much power right at my fingertip.

I resist the call and keep the power at a distance. I am still mortal; I am still weak. It might be cliche but the term ‘memento mori’ does ring true to me. It’s usually an object kept to remind a person of the inevitability of death, for me it’s my very mortal body with acts as a memento mori.

“Stable,” I say, relaxing on my throne. As it is now, I could remain mortal and survive without the mana backlash killing me as it does for others. I have to wonder about the particular nature of the phenomena, but research projects would just be another waste of my time.

Drawing the mana back out of my throne I affect a few more changes in my flesh, readying myself for the advancement into crystal density. There are only five planned adaptions necessary, and I have enough mana for all of them, and some change left over to keep my land defended.

Fatty-tissue blood storage, catalyst sweat glands, layered space muscles, burst reflex muscles, and nail shifters. The first simply stores blood inside my fat tissues, this way I’m carrying around blood bags wherever I go, to keep me from bleeding out.

Sweat glands will give me annihilation magic boosts when I cast through my sweat glands. It will tie into my shields; this lets me cast shields quickly and efficiently.

The two muscle adaptions allow for faster and more powerful reflexes, while the layered space adaption lets me have the muscles of a circus strongman packed away into little pocket dimensions around my body—all the power, without any of the muscleman aesthetics.

Nail shifters are the most interesting, but incomplete. There are tricks to effectively casting magic that you haven’t the natural talent for, and this adaption is a form of that. My fingernails and toenails can now absorb the ‘elemental essence’ of other magics. I’ll still need to gather that essence, and somehow apply it—blended nail polish, maybe—but the potential is one that I cannot ignore.

Beyond as much, I cut through the last of my flesh, searching for the few parts of me that still hold me back. Time will not wait, and the more I waste in these efforts, the less opportunity I have to truly live my life.

Burning away the parts of me that hold me back, reforging myself into something stronger, I let the adaptions settle into me and I step up from my throne.

The changes are… difficult. My muscles are already more powerful and quicker to react, but I’ve already gotten used to such things in the past from upgrading my nervous system and increasing my mana density. I can handle this much.

“Who’s free?” I wonder, looking about the city.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“So much of history is made up of lies. The original stories are embellished or tainted by whoever retells them, then over time, the story gets changed further and further from the truth until all that’s left are small pieces of the original. The truth is either a tiny fragment of the story we know or gone entirely, burnt away like fuel to create the forged stories that replace it.”

When I asked her about her obsession with history, I didn’t quite expect Vii to become absorbed in the telling of her passions. Yet, it’s always nice to simply hear her like this, lively and entranced by her thoughts and feelings. She’s not holding back, just letting it all loose in a torrent of words and feelings.

“I was always interested in the stories that were made of myth, the legends that went back even further than anyone could really know,” she says. “It’s impossible to tell what’s what without seeing it for yourself.”

“Your talent for time magic really was a boon for you,” I say. “Anyone else would be looking to go back and change history, or set themselves up as an immortal dictator, ruling over all of time.”

“Is that what you’d do?” Vii asks.

“It’s what I’m doing without your powers,” I reply. “If you mean would I go back further still when my enemies are vulnerable… then probably not. If I didn’t have you, or the others in my life, then I likely would.

“There’s nothing special about this reality that makes it inherently better than any alternative that could arise, the only reason I’d want to preserve this timeline is to preserve my relationships with everyone here.”

“You and Eshya are probably right about that…” Vii says, waving her wings out and taking a deep breath. “Why worry about changing the future when we can make an even better future in its place?”

“Eshya said the same thing?” I’m not entirely surprised.

“She did,” Vii nods. “‘Just win the fight ahead of you, and make a better tomorrow. Overthinking the rest is for idiots like Kyra to worry about.’ That’s what she said, and she’s right.”

I snort a laugh, as I think back to my conversation with Eshya just before. She’s not all so laid back as she pretends to be, and even if she doesn’t speak it all the time, she’s overthinking things just as much as anyone.

“I’ll leave it all to you,” Vii says, her expression turning grave. “Our future, all of reality itself, I can’t deal with all the consequences if I do something wrong. I’ve seen the future, and I’m terrified of what I might do wrong to make it a worse place.

“Yet, you… you don’t know what the future will bring. You know so much less than me, but you’re pushing on ahead anyway to try and make things better. To try and change things into something closer to your ideal.”

“I’m not that amazing,” I say.

“You’re just brutishly killing those in your way, and bringing everyone together under your power with the promise of a better life,” Vii says. “You’re willing to act, even knowing that it could all go horribly wrong.”

“It won’t go horribly wrong, I won’t let things turn out that way.”

“Exactly!” Vii says. “That’s why I’m placing my trust in you.”

“I thought I already had your trust?” I ask.

“Most of it, part of it,” Vii bounces about a little in thought. “I lie to myself sometimes, too, you know. It can be difficult to say the whole truth all of the time.”

“You have all of my trust,” I say, shrugging my shoulders. “I doubt everyone and everything. I can’t trust any institutions or people in positions of power. You’re one of the few people I trust with everything I have.”

“Desperation…” Vii says.

“Sorry?”

“Our relationship was formed… quickly,” Vii says. “Really, really quickly. I understand some of it, I know that I was afraid and alone, and it just seemed to make sense in the moment.”

“Love at first sight?”

“Oh, for me?” Vii asks, blushing as she waves a wing at herself. “I first fell in love with the myth of you countless years from now. I was talking about you. Why did you grow so attached? Desperation.”

“Again, sorry?”

“You were desperate for people you could trust,” Vii says, nodding to herself. “You pushed for this relationship because you weren’t willing to trust someone without giving them your everything, so that’s what you did.”

“I guess?” I say, rubbing at my arms. It feels weird for her to break down my character like this. “I’d prefer just to say that I fell in love with some beautiful young women.”

“Sorry about being weird,” Vii says.

“It’s a part of what I love about you, it’s fine.”

“You know I came here to this time to meet you? You were some distant historical figure, somewhere between a devil and a self-righteous warlord-”

“Aren’t they both bad things?”

“It was a silly crush I had for a mythical figure,” Vii says, ignoring me. “It was all my own fantasy back then, who would have thought that it would bring me here.”

“How do I compare to the myth you fell for?” I ask.

“You’re not as cool as your legend.”

“I still have time to work on that,” I retort.

“You’re pretty, but you’re not some legendary beauty that would stun the hearts of any young man or maiden.”

“I’m wounded, wounded I say.”

“You’ve surrounded yourself with girls, but you’re not some demonic deviant capturing whole worlds and forcing them into your harem.”

“I only take the pretty ones.”

“That’s sarcasm, isn’t it?” Vii asks.

“Nope,” I reply. “I’m not lying. I get a bit possessive when I see someone attractive.”

“You want to steal them away?” Vii asks, taken aback.

“Isn’t that natural?” I ask, raising a brow. “I mean, I won’t actually do it. I just don’t have the time in a day to give proper attention to all the women that I find attractive, even just the ones who are fully enthusiastic in their consent. It doesn’t change that I feel possessive, though.”

Vii’s brows dip a little and she starts whispering to herself as thoughts fly through her mind in a whirlwind that I can’t quite keep up with. I could if I wanted to but I don’t want our relationship to be like that.

“You don’t feel the same way?” I ask. “A desperate desire to claim and protect cute people and things?”

“Not really,” Vii says. “I’m just happy to be close all the time with the people that I love. Our relationship is strange to me, I always thought that I’d just find someone who I loved one day and settle down eventually dying when some war or another started.

“To me, this relationship with Eshya, Adler, Nel, and you it’s… it’s a bit weird.” Her tone is light and fluffy as if the words aren’t burdened by the weight that they ought to impose. “I like spending time with everyone, it’s exciting to be together, and the thought of raising our kids together as a great big family is… it’s nice. It feels safe, comfortable, happy, and I feel this great big bubble of joy just thinking about it.”

“Me too,” I reply. What I don’t say is that half the time that joy is hidden by worry, the great big ball of fear and fury that I rely on to push through the hard times. It’s not as though I’m keeping it from her, but it’s not something to bring up in a moment like this.

“I hate the way you look at me sometimes,” Vii says out of nowhere. “We’re supposed to be open and talk about things, right? Communication is the cornerstone of a good relationship? I heard that somewhere once. I don’t like the way you look at me sometimes like you’re holding back.”

“It’s not-”

“It kind of is though, isn’t it?” Vii asks. “I don’t like killing, and you know that. There are a lot of things that I don’t really like or topics that bother me. You used to be open about it all, you brought me along when you killed that first gang in the upper ruins, but now… We’ve been busy, and there are times when it feels we’re getting more distant.”

“I don’t keep anything from you,” I say. “It’s just that some topics would ruin the mood. I like it better when you’re happy and excited.”

“You don’t need to protect me, you know?”

“I do, you’re delicate and there are some really big mean monsters out there,” I say.

“That’s not what I mean, and you know it,” she says. “Are you ashamed?”

“Ashamed?”

“I keep thinking back to everyone we’ve killed. The gremlins in this city especially, even if they don’t seem to care about it anymore. It’s because they’re so used to death that even the most horrible of things are just normal to them.

“It doesn’t have to be,” Vii says. “There are so many different cultures, and ways of life, almost all of them kinder than what they suffered through.”

“I’m strong enough now to change things for them,” I say. “We’re all wild beasts until we’re powerful enough to protect our own communities, and every empire is built on the graves of those who came before. Life is built on death.”

“That’s not the way they like to tell it,” Vii says. “Every empire tells tales about their righteous rise to power, their grand, or even divine, right to rule. Some lie and claim that no one came before, others claim that it was their right to take the land from those who came before.”

“Lies,” we say together, and Vii chuckles brightly, even given the topic.

“That’s one of the things I like about you as a leader, Kyra.” She says, “You’re not telling the gremlins that they were wrong or evil to resist us.”

“They weren’t wrong to fight us,” I admit. “The only thing they did ‘wrong’ was lose the war. I hate that that’s how this all works.”

“But you’re willing to admit it,” Vii says. “You’re not claiming to rule by some divine or grand moral right. You’re willing to admit that the only reason you’re in charge is because you’re strongest.”

“Not exactly, but close enough,” I say. “I rule because they let me rule. They let me rule because they don’t want to invite my wrath. It’s a tense relationship, but we can’t have anything better without taking the time to instil a shared culture and trust.”

“You’re open about that,” Vii says. “Most others aren’t. The monarchy claims to have some divine right, the republic claims to be run through democratic elections but everyone knows that the elections are rigged against the weak.”

“The monarchy needs to convince their peasants that they should be satisfied where they are, and the republic needs to convince their citizens that they too can rise to the top. The lies serve a purpose.”

“Then what is the purpose of the truth that you tell them?” Vii asks.

“It encourages honesty,” I reply with a shrug. “I don’t want my citizens to slave as lowly labourers or work themselves to the bone to try and get ahead. I’d rather leave them free to explore their own fates.”

“That’s what’s interesting about you,” Vii says.

“It’s not my charming personality?”

“I mean as a figure, as a leader,” Vii says. “You’re a good empress.”

“No emperor or king is a good man,” I shake my head. “That goes for me, too.”

“Kyra,” Vii says my name, wrapping me up in a tight hug. “Just because you do bad things, doesn’t mean that you’re a bad person.”

“I’ll have to trust you on that.” I nod, smiling easily.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Stats and Skills

~Mana Form:

Current mana density: 52,271 / 60,892 units

Current mana volume: 25,985 / 30,271 shards

Mana volume at crystallisation density (Max. mana volume):

Kyra: 30,271 shards

Kyra’s armour: 20,777 shards

Kyra’s throne: 1,109,298 shards

~Forms

Mana Canon

-Annihilation Heart (Adapted)

-Blood Fuel (Adapted)

-Bone Magic Storage (Adapted)

-Nail Shifters (Adapted)

Dancer

-Flash Nerves (Adapted)

-Quick Perception Mind (Adapted)

-Burst Reflex Muscles (Adapted)

-Layered Space Muscles (Adapted)

Turtle

-Rebinding Tissue (Adapted)

-Catalyst Sweat Glands (Adapted)

-Repulsive Skin (Adapted)

-Prehensile hair (Adapted)

-Fatty Tissue Blood Storage (Adapted)

Investigator

-Wide eyes (Adapted)

-Wide ears (Adapted)

-Sharp nose (Adapted)

Misc.

-Clean bowels (Adapted)

-Mana Drive (Adapted)

~Favourited Skills:

Magic:

-Annihilation Magic (Customised)

-Fire Magic (Functional)

-Space magic (Broken)

-Force magic (Functional)

-Ice magic (Broken)

-Wind magic (Broken)

Movement:

-Hand-to-hand casting (Functional)

-Mana surge movement (Functional)

-Stealth (Functional)

Senses:

-Eyes of an Empire (Customised)

-Combat Awareness (Functional)

-Watchmen (Functional)

-Hidden bug (Mastered)

-De-tagging (Mastered)

-Anti-stealth sight (Mastered)

Special:

-Spirit Transformation (Broken)

-Conformity (Broken)

-Training mana form (Functional)